President Open to Benchmarks in Iraq Measure

President Bush, who visited the Pentagon, said he would agree to setting firm goals for the Iraqi government in the spending bill that is being debated in Congress. Though he had agreed to benchmarks before, Mr. Bush was unwilling to link them to financing or troop withdrawal.Credit
Stephen Crowley/The New York Times

WASHINGTON, May 10 — Hours before the House approved a plan on Thursday to finance the Iraq war only through midsummer, President Bush offered his first public concession to try to resolve the impasse on war spending, acknowledging rising pressure from his own party and the public.

After a briefing at the Pentagon, Mr. Bush said he had instructed Joshua B. Bolten, the White House chief of staff, to reach “common ground” with lawmakers of both parties over setting firm goals, or benchmarks, to measure progress in Iraq. Mr. Bush had previously insisted that he wanted about $95 billion for the military with no strings attached.

“It makes sense to have benchmarks as a part of our discussion on how to go forward,” Mr. Bush said, even as he threatened to veto the House plan, approved on a 221-to-205 vote Thursday night, which would require him to seek approval in two months for the balance of the war money.

Still, Congressional leaders say the plan may never reach his desk, because the Senate is likely to take a different approach.

Before the vote on Thursday, House Democrats demonstrated their opposition to continuing the war when 169 of them voted for a separate plan that would have required the withdrawal of American troops to begin in 90 days, with most forces out within another six months.

Two Republicans joined in that effort, which failed by a 255-to-171 vote. Still, the plan attracted more support than anticipated. Speaker Nancy Pelosi was among those voting in favor of it. Fifty-nine Democrats, including Representative Steny H. Hoyer of Maryland, the majority leader, opposed the proposal along with 196 Republicans.

“We finally got to vote for what we believed in,” said Representative Jim McGovern, Democrat of Massachusetts and a sponsor of the withdrawal plan.

The bill approved by the House would provide $42.8 billion total, with about $30 billion directed to the war effort for the next two months. It requires the president to report by July 13 on how the Iraqi government is performing in building its military and moving toward achieving political unity. Congress would then vote a second time on whether to give the administration the remainder of the money — about $50 billion — to maintain operations in Iraq through Sept. 30 or to restrict that money to deployment.

“No more,” said Mr. Hoyer, who backed the plan. “No more blank checks.”

Republicans derided the Democratic approach as war on the installment plan, and they and Mr. Bush said the two-stage financing was unworkable. Once the Senate is through with its negotiations, lawmakers say, a final measure may be ready for the White House by the end of the month.

Mr. Bush, who on Tuesday received a blunt assessment from Republican moderates about rising voter unrest over Iraq, acknowledged the public’s impatience with the war. But he said he could not allow political considerations like “the latest opinion poll, or how we can get our members elected” to drive his thinking.

“My message to the members of Congress is, whatever your beliefs may be, let’s make sure our troops get funded, and let’s make sure politicians don’t tell our commanders how to conduct operations,” Mr. Bush said.

Though Republicans voted solidly with the president, many made it clear that the administration had until September — the deadline for a progress report from Gen. David H. Petraeus, the commander in Iraq — to prove its war strategy was working. While it was Republican moderates who took their complaints directly to the president this week, others in the party expressed similar misgivings on Thursday.

“There is a significant undercurrent that is looking for a reasonable way forward in Iraq,” said Representative Jeff Fortenberry, a conservative Republican of Nebraska, adding that the war is a leading concern for his constituents. “People are very conflicted in their hearts.”

Several Republicans are considering bipartisan legislation aimed at changing the war’s course. Senators Olympia Snowe of Maine and Lamar Alexander of Tennessee have introduced separate proposals aimed at bringing a gradual end to the war.

“We are troubled by the current policy,” Ms. Snowe said Thursday. “The White House needs to hear it.”

While the White House has not opposed setting general goals for progress in Iraq, they have resisted any effort to tie financing or troop withdrawal plans to the benchmarks.

On Thursday, Democrats welcomed the president’s new willingness to authorize negotiations on benchmarks but said any failure by Iraq to meet specified goals must result in penalties or they would be meaningless.

“There is a recognition that things are not going well,” said Senator Harry Reid, Democrat of Nevada and the majority leader. “The only person who doesn’t believe there needs to be a change is the president.”

The Senate hopes to consider its version of the war spending measure sometime next week, and Democrats have not made public many of their ideas. Lawmakers and senior administration officials say the most likely course is that the Senate would approve a new measure dropping the withdrawal date Mr. Bush objected to in vetoing the initial legislation but retaining other restrictions, while providing the president the ability to waive them. The White House has not been receptive in the past to proposals for such waivers.

Speaking on condition of anonymity, a senior White House official disputed the notion that Mr. Bush’s agreement to consider signing a bill with specific benchmarks for the Iraqis to meet was tied to Republican complaints that more pressure be brought to bear on the Iraqi government to make faster progress toward political reconciliation.

The official said the president understood that if General Petraeus delivered a bad assessment of conditions in Iraq in September, it would make it hard for some Republicans to continue supporting the war. For all of the administration’s complaints about the Democratic approach, officials concede that the lawmakers’ efforts to impose a timetable for American withdrawal may at least have helped emphasize the president’s point to the Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki that American patience is wearing thin and Iraq needs to act more urgently toward political reconciliation.

Some White House officials privately expressed displeasure Thursday that the concerns the Republican moderates raised with the president became public. Vice President Dick Cheney did not mince words in an interview with the Fox News Channel. “We didn’t get elected to be popular,” Mr. Cheney said. “We didn’t get elected to worry just about the fate of the Republican Party.”

Some lawmakers said they had lost patience not only with the war in Iraq, but also with the continuing legislative and political conflict in Congress as the two parties maneuver over the war.

“The Republicans should not be saying the Democrats don’t support the troops, nor should the Democrats be calling Republicans warmongers,” said Representative Jo Ann Emerson, Republican of Missouri and one of the 11 moderates who met with Mr. Bush on Tuesday. “Politics have taken over, and our soldiers deserve better.”

Jeff Zeleny contributed reporting.

A version of this article appears in print on , on Page A1 of the New York edition with the headline: President Open To Benchmarks In Iraq Measure. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe